Volpone and Other Plays
Page 21
SURLY: Sir, I will. –
[Aside] But, by attorney, and to a second purpose.
Now I am sure it is a bawdy-house;
I’ll swear it, were the Marshal here to thank me!
The naming this commander doth confirm it.
300 Don Face! Why he’s the most authentic dealer
I’ these commodities, the superintendent
To all the quainter traffickers in town!
He is their visitor, and does appoint
Who lies with whom, and at what hour, what price,
Which gown, and in what smock, what fall, what tire.
Him will I prove, by a third person, to find
The subtleties of this dark labyrinth:
Which if I do discover, dear Sir Mammon,
You’ll give your poor friend leave, though no philosopher,
310 To laugh; for you that are, ’tis thought, shall weep.
FACE: Sir, he does pray you’ll not forget.
SURLY: I will not, sir.
Sir Epicure, I shall leave you?
[Exit.]
MAMMON: I follow you straight.
FACE: But do so, good sir, to avoid suspicion.
This gent’ man has a parlous head.
MAMMON: But wilt thou, Ulen,
Be constant to thy promise?
FACE: As my life, sir.
MAMMON: And wilt thou insinuate what I am, and praise me,
And say I am a noble fellow?
FACE: O, what else, sir?
And that you’ll make her royal with the Stone,
An empress; you yourself King of Bantam.
320 MAMMON: Wilt thou do this?
FACE: Will I, sir!
MAMMON: Lungs, my Lungs!
I love thee.
FACE: Send your stuff, sir, that my master
May busy himself about projection.
MAMMON: Thou’st witched me, rogue. Take, go.
[Gives him money.]
FACE: Your jack, and all, sir.
MAMMON: Thou art a villain – I will send my jack,
And the weights too. Slave, I could bite thine ear.
Away, thou dost not care for me.
FACE: Not I, sir?
MAMMON: Come, I was born to make thee, my good weasel;
Set thee on a bench, and ha’ thee twirl a chain
With the best lord’s vermin of ’em all.
330 FACE: Away, sir.
MAMMON: A Count, nay, a Count Palatine –
FACE: Good sir, go.
MAMMON: – shall not advance thee better; no, nor faster.
[Exit.]
II, iv[Enter SUBTLE and DOL.]
[SUBTLE:] Has he bit? has he bit?
FACE: And swallowed, too, my Subtle.
I ha’ given him line, and now he plays, i’ faith.
SUBTLE: And shall we twitch him?
FACE: Thorough both the gills.
A wench is a rare bait, with which a man
No sooner’s taken, but he straight firks mad.
SUBTLE: Dol, my Lord What’s-hum’s sister, you must now
Bear yourself statelich.
DOL COMMON: O, let me alone.
I’ll not forget my race, I warrant you.
I’ll keep my distance, laugh and talk aloud;
10 Have all the tricks of a proud scurvy lady,
And be as rude’s her woman.
FACE: Well said, Sanguine!
SUBTLE: But will he send his andirons?
FACE: His jack too,
And’s iron shoeing-horn. I ha’ spoke to him. Well,
I must not lose my wary gamester yonder.
SUBTLE: O, Monsieur Caution, that will not be gulled?
FACE: Ay, if I can strike a fine hook into him, now,
The Temple-church, there I have cast mine angle.
Well, pray for me. I’ll about it.
One knocks.
SUBTLE: What, more gudgeons!
Dol, scout, scout!
[DOL looks out of the window.]
Stay, Face, you must go to the door.
20 Pray God it be my Anabaptist – Who is ’t, Dol?
DOL COMMON: I know him not. He looks like a gold-end-man.
SUBTLE: Godso! ’tis he; he said he would send – what call you him?
The sanctifièd elder, that should deal
For Mammon’s jack and andirons. Let him in.
Stay, help me off, first, with my gown.
[Exit FACE.]
Away,
Madam, to your withdrawing chamber. Now,
[Exit DOL.]
In a new tune, new gesture, but old language.
This fellow is sent from one negotiates with me
About the Stone, too, for the holy Brethren
30 Of Amsterdam, the exiled Saints, that hope
To raise their discipline by it. I must use him
In some strange fashion now, to make him admire me.
[Enter ANANIAS.]
[SUBTLE:] Where is my drudge?
[Re-enter FACE.]
FACE: Sir?
SUBTLE: Take away the recipient,
And rectify your menstrue from the phlegma.
Then pour it o’ the Sol, in the cucurbite,
And let ’em macerate together.
FACE: Yes, sir.
And save the ground?
SUBTLE: No. Terra damnata
Must not have entrance in the work. – Who are you?
ANANIAS: A faithful Brother, if it please you.
SUBTLE: What’s that?
A Lullianist? a Ripley? Filius artis?
Can you sublime and dulcify? calcine?
10 Know you the sapor pontic? sapor stiptic?
Or what is homogene, or heterogene?
ANANIAS: I understand no heathen language, truly.
SUBTLE: Heathen! You Knipperdoling! Is Ars sacra,
Or chrysopœia, or spagyrica,
Or the pamphysic, or panarchic knowledge,
A heathen language?
ANANIAS: Heathen Greek, I take it.
SUBTLE: How! heathen Greek?
ANANIAS: All’s heathen but the Hebrew.
SUBTLE: Sirrah my varlet, stand you forth and speak to him
Like a philosopher. Answer i’ the language.
20 Name the vexations, and the martyrizations
Of metals in the work.
FACE: Sir, putrefaction,
Solution, ablution, sublimation,
Cohobation, calcination, ceration, and
Fixation.
SUBTLE: This is heathen Greek, to you, now? –
And when comes vivification?
FACE: After mortification.
SUBTLE: What’s cohobation?
FACE: ’Tis the pouring on
Your aqua regis, and then drawing him off,
To the trine circle of the Seven Spheres.
30 SUBTLE: What’s the proper passion of metals?
FACE: Malleation.
SUBTLE: What’s your ultimum supplicium auri?
FACE: Antimonium.
SUBTLE: This’s heathen Greek to you?–And what’s your mercury?
FACE: A very fugitive, he will be gone, sir.
SUBTLE: How know you him?
FACE: By his viscosity, His oleosity, and his suscitability.
SUBTLE: How do you sublime him?
FACE: With the calce of egg-shells, White marble, talc.
SUBTLE:
Your magisterium now, What’s that?
FACE: Shifting, sir, your elements,
Dry into cold, cold into moist, moist into hot,
Hot into dry.
SUBTLE: This’s heathen Greek to you still? – Your Lapis Philosophicus?
40 FACE: ’Tis a stone,
And not a stone; a spirit, a soul, and a body,
Which if you do dissolve, it is dissolved;
If you coagulate, it is coagulated;
If you make it to fly, it flieth.
SUBTLE: Enough.
[Exit FACE.]
This’s heathen Greek to you? What are you, sir?
ANANIAS: Please you, a servant of the exiled Brethren,
That deal with widows’ and with orphans’ goods,
And make a just account unto the Saints –
A deacon.
50 SUBTLE: O, you are sent from Master Wholesome,
Your teacher?
ANANIAS: From Tribulation Wholesome,
Our very zealous pastor.
SUBTLE: Good! I have
Some orphans’ goods to come here.
ANANIAS: Of what kind, sir?
SUBTLE: Pewter and brass, andirons and kitchen-ware,
Metals, that we must use our med’ cine on:
Wherein the Brethren may have a penn’ orth
For ready money.
ANANIAS: Were the orphans’ parents
Sincere professors?
SUBTLE: Why do you ask?
ANANIAS: Because
We then are to deal justly, and give, in truth,
Their utmost value.
SUBTLE: ’Slid, you’d cozen else,
60 And if their parents were not of the faithful? –
I will not trust you, now I think on’t,
Till I ha’ talked with your pastor. Ha’ you brought money
To buy more coals?
ANANIAS: No, surely.
SUBTLE: No? How so?
ANANIAS: The Brethren bid me say unto you, sir,
Surely, they will not venture any more
Till they may see projection.
SUBTLE: How!
ANANIAS: You’ve had,
For the instruments, as bricks, and loam, and glasses,
Already thirty pound; and, for materials,
They say, some ninety more. And they have heard since,
70 That one at Heidelberg made it of an egg,
And a small paper of pin-dust.
SUBTLE: What’s your name?
ANANIAS: My name is Ananias.
SUBTLE: Out, the varlet
That cozened the Apostles! Hence, away!
Flee, mischief! Had your holy consistory
No name to send me, of another sound
Than wicked Ananias? Send your elders
Hither to make atonement for you, quickly,
And gi’ me satisfaction; or out goes
The fire, and down th’ alembics, and the furnace,
80 Piger Henricus, or what not. Thou wretch!
Both sericon and bufo shall be lost,
Tell ’em. All hope of rooting out the bishops,
Or th’ Anti-Christian hierarchy shall perish,
If they stay threescore minutes; the aqueity,
Terreity, and sulphureity
Shall run together again, and all be annulled,
Thou wicked Ananias!
[Exit ANANIAS.]
This will fetch ’em,
And make ’em haste towards their gulling more.
A man must deal like a rough nurse, and fright
90 Those that are froward to an appetite.
II, vi [Enter FACE, in his Captain’s uniform, with DRUGGER.]
[FACE:] He’s busy with his spirits, but we’ll upon him.
SUBTLE: How now! What mates, what Bayards ha’ we here?
FACE: I told you he would be furious. – Sir, here’s Nab
Has brought you another piece of gold to look on;
(We must appease him. Give it me.) and prays you,
You would devise – what is it, Nab?
DRUGGER: A sign, sir.
FACE: Ay, a good lucky one, a thriving sign, Doctor.
SUBTLE: I was devising now.
FACE [aside to SUBTLE]: ’Slight, do not say so,
He will repent he ga’ you any more. –
What say you to his constellation, Doctor, 10
The Balance?
SUBTLE: No, that way is stale and common.
A townsman, born in Taurus, gives the bull,
Or the bull’s head; in Aries, the ram, –
A poor device! No, I will have his name
Formed in some mystic character, whose radii,
Striking the senses of the passers-by,
Shall, by a virtual influence, breed affections,
That may result upon the party owns it;
As thus –
FACE: Nab!
SUBTLE: He first shall have a bell, that’s Abel:
And by it standing one whose name is Dee, 20
In a rug gown, there’s D., and Rug, that’s Drug;
And right anenst him a dog snarling er;
There’s Drugger, Abel Drugger. That’s his sign.
And here’s now mystery and hieroglyphic!
FACE: Abel, thou art made.
DRUGGER: Sir, I do thank his worship.
FACE: Six o’ thy legs more will not do it, Nab.
He has brought you a pipe of tobacco, Doctor.
DRUGGER: Yes, sir. I have another thing I would impart –
FACE: Out with it, Nab.
DRUGGER: Sir, there is lodged, hard by me,
30 A rich young widow –
FACE: Good! a bona roba?
DRUGGER: But nineteen at the most.
FACE: Very good, Abel.
DRUGGER: Marry, she’s not in fashion yet; she wears A hood, but’t stands a-cop.
FACE: No matter, Abel.
DRUGGER: And I do now and then give her a fucus –
FACE: What! dost thou deal, Nab?
SUBTLE: I did tell you, Captain.
DRUGGER: And physic too, sometime, sir; for which she trusts me
With all her mind. She’s come up here of purpose
To learn the fashion.
FACE: Good (his match too!) – On, Nab.
DRUGGER: And she does strangely long to know her fortune.
40 FACE: God’s lid, Nab, send her to the Doctor, hither.
DRUGGER: Yes, I have spoke to her of his worship already;
But she’s afraid it will be blown abroad,
And hurt her marriage.
FACE: Hurt it! ’tis the way
To heal it, if ’twere hurt; to make it more
Followed and sought. Nab, thou shalt tell her this.
She’ll be more known, more talked of; and your widows
Are ne’er of any price till they be famous.
Their honour is their multitude of suitors.
Send her, it may be thy good fortune. What?
Thou dost not know?
50 DRUGGER: No, sir, she’ll never marry
Under a knight. Her brother has made a vow.
FACE: What! and dost thou despair, my little Nab,
Knowing what the Doctor has set down for thee,
And seeing so many o’ the City dubbed?
One glass o’ thy water, with a madam I know,
Will have it done, Nab. What’s her brother? a Knight?
DRUGGER: No, sir, a gentleman newly warm in’s land, sir,
Scarce cold in his one-and-twenty, that does govern
His sister here; and is a man himself
60 Of some three thousand a year, and is come up
To learn to quarrel, and to live by his wits,
And will go down again, and die i’ the country.
FACE: How! to quarrel?
DRUGGER: Yes, sir, to carry quarrels,
As gallants do; to manage ’em by line.
FACE: ’Slid, Nab! The Doctor is the only man
In Christendom for him! He has made a table,
With mathematical demonstrations,
Touching the art of quarrels. He will give him
An instrument to quarrel. Go, bring ’em both,
70 Him and his sister. And, for thee, with her
The Doctor happ’ ly may persuade. Go to!
Shalt give his worship a new damask suit
Upon the premises.
SUBTLE: O, good Captain!
FACE: He shall,
He is the honestest fellow, Do
ctor. Stay not,
No offers; bring the damask, and the parties.
DRUGGER: I’ll try my power, sir.
FACE: And thy will too, Nab.
SUBTLE: ’Tis good tobacco, this! What is’t an ounce?
FACE: He’ll send you a pound, Doctor.
SUBTLE: O no.
FACE: He will do’t
It is the goodest soul! – Abel, about it
80 Thou shalt know more gone. Away, be gone.
[Exit DRUGGER.]
A miserable rogue, and lives with cheese,
And has the worms. That was the cause, indeed,
Why he came now. He dealt with me in private,
To get a med’ cine for ’em.
SUBTLE: And shall, sir. This works.
FACE: A wife, a wife for one on’s, my dear Subtle!
We’ll e’en draw lots, and he that fails shall have
The more in goods, the other has in tail.
SUBTLE: Rather the less. For she may be so light
She may want grains.
FACE: Ay, or be such a burden,
90 A man would scarce endure her for the whole.
SUBTLE: Faith, best let’s see her first, and then determine.
FACE: Content. But Dol must ha’ no breath on’t.
SUBTLE: Mum.
Away you, to your Surly yonder, catch him.
FACE: Pray God I ha’ not stayed too long.
SUBTLE: I fear it.
[Exeunt.]
ACT THREE
[SCENE ONE] III, i
[Outside Lovewit’s house.]
[Enter TRIBULATION WHOLESOME and ANANIAS.]
[TRIBULATION:] These chastisements are common to the Saints,
And such rebukes we of the Separation
Must bear with willing shoulders, as the trials
Sent forth to tempt our frailties.
ANANIAS: In pure zeal,
I do not like the man. He is a heathen,
And speaks the language of Canaan, truly.
TRIBULATION: I think him a profane person indeed.
ANANIAS: He bears
The visible mark of the Beast in his forehead.
And for his Stone, it is a work of darkness,
10 And with philosophy blinds the eyes of man
TRIBULATION: Good Brother, we must bend unto all means
That may give furtherance to the Holy Cause.
ANANIAS: Which his cannot. The Sanctifièd Cause
Should have a sanctified course.
TRIBULATION: Not always necessary.
The children of perdition are oft-times
Made instruments even of the greatest works.
Beside, we should give somewhat to man’s nature,
The place he lives in, still about the fire,
And fume of metals, that intoxicate
20 The brain of man, and make him prone to passion.
Where have you greater atheists than your cooks?
Or more profane, or choleric, than your glass-men?
More Anti-Christian than your bell-founders?